Fishing rod holders are adapted in general to be mounted to water vessels or stationary platforms such as docks or the like. A fishing rod holder should have the function of positioning a fishing rod in a substantially secure orientation that is adapted to handle the loads of a fish that hooks to the bait of the fishing line attached to the rod in a well-known and conventional manner. Further, the fishing rod should be reasonably accessible, in that if the bait of the fishing pole is taken by fish, oftentimes the fisherman will want to grab the rod and remove it from its stored location to a removed position of the fishing pole where the fisherman is actively and dynamically reeling in his catch.
It is generally desirable to rest a fishing pole in a stored location that is reasonably secure, where the fisherman has confidence that a bite on the line from a fish will not pull their whole fishing rod assembly overboard; this can account for a costly loss of equipment as well as a ruined outing. Further, the fish must endure its final days of living with a hook at its mouth that is attached to a relatively large mass that partially mobilizes and perhaps causes a painful death to the fish. It is generally desirable to have a fishing rod in a stored location when the fisherman is tired and fatigued of holding the rod or while he or she is trolling. Further, while fishing with more than one rod, the fisherman must store the nonactive rod in a fishing rod retention type device.
Prior art fishing rod holders have generally failed to meet the criteria of positioning a fishing rod in a stored location that is substantially secure from removal upon the load exerted thereon by a fish at the forward end portion of a pole and having easy and convenient access to the fishing rod for removal from the stored location by the fisherman on quick demand when a bite is on the line of the fishing rod line. There are numerous advantages to quickly removing a fishing rod such as when fishing from a drift boat where tree limbs and other objects threaten to break the fishing rod while in the stored position; it is desirable for the fisherman to quickly and effectively remove the fishing rod when it is in such a perilous position. Therefore, quick and easy removal of a fishing rod in a timely fashion is desired, so as to make it possible for the rod holder to fight a fish quickly and effectively with minimal struggle and resistance. In one form, a fishing rod holder with one moving piece with an offset rotation axis allows for significant advantages.
In one form, the fishing rod retention assembly allows for placing of the rod further out over the gunnel of a boat. Further, the removal of the rod can be accomplished to the fisherman's desired angle of pull whether it be from leftward, rightward or upward directions. This variety of movement for releasing the fishing rod from the stored location allows for minimal training and adapting to the fishing rod retention assembly by the user, which eases the frustration that is present with prior art devices. Further, in one form the fisherman can immediately pull the rod from the holder with either one hand or two hands without any significant amount of force applied thereto. However, the rod remains intact securely in a stored location when the force of a fish on the line at the forward end portion of the fishing rod is applied to the fishing rod.
In the particular application of fishing known as downrigging, oftentimes careful attention must be applied when removing a fishing rod from its holder so as to not trip the downrigging ball which would require resetting the release and fishing rod. The fishing rod retention assembly as described below is particularly conducive for this application. Generally, setting up a downrigger is often problematic because the rod must be maintained in a position to keep various lines from entangling each other. When a downrigger line is tripped, the downrigger may be released. The fishing rod retention assembly described below allows for easy placement of the fishing rod therein to prevent tangling of such lines.
When a fisherman uses barbless hooks, hooking and landing a fish is far more difficult. In this application, once the fisherman hooks a fish, he or she must maintain constant tension upon the fishing line after setting the hook or the fish can potentially get away. The quick release design of the fishing rod retention assembly described below is conducive for maintaining constant tension upon the fishing line.
The fishing rod retention assembly allows for a very quick method to secure a rod in a stored location, and also a very quick method of retrieving the rod to a removed active location of the fishing rod. The minimal amount of movement and resistance allows for very easy retrieval, and even when employing the lock assembly described below, the removal process is extremely fast and does not require “getting used to” the device. Because such a minimal amount of movement is required to position the rod from the stored location within the fishing rod assembly to a removed position, there is minimal force and displacement upon the line which is particularly advantageous when downrigging. To remove the rod from the fishing rod retention assembly the fishing rod is repositioned in a manner substantially orthogonal to the central axis of the fishing rod. Further, to position the fishing rod within the J-hook assembly, the fisherman needs only to position the fishing rod substantially downwardly with slight lateral movement where the fishing rod is repositioned in a manner that is orthogonal to the central axis. This can be accomplished with one hand, keeping one hand free to either hold the line away from rod guides when using a downrigger, or to rest on the tiller handle or the steering wheel of the boat.